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Magical Domain
Magical Domain
By kanity
View on ldjam.com
| Category | Rank | Score | Count |
|
|---|
| Overall | 515 | 3.63 | 53 | |
| Fun | 745 | 3.26 | 53 | |
| Innovation | 758 | 3.14 | 52 | |
| Theme | 591 | 3.92 | 53 | |
| Graphics | 506 | 3.81 | 53 | |
| Humor | 601 | 3.04 | 50 | |
| Mood | 258 | 3.91 | 53 | |
Comments
jdeedubs
2023-05-03 17:01
This game is a gem. I really liked that each creature had their own musical theme. My favourites were the witches theme and the bakery. The character designs were very nice, and the world really matched the story.
I should have checked the options at first, but I was sad to see that I could have been running the whole game rather than walking. A little controls tutorial, or a smaller map would be nice in a simple fetch quest loop.
The writing was very good. Profoundly sad at parts, but I think it really carried the game for me. It had vibes of old children's fairytales. (Did the baker cook his family?)
I'm glad I landed here, in this transportive glade of a game.
kanity
2023-05-03 23:11
@jdeedubs Thank you so much for your thoughtful comment, it makes me very happy! I love old fairy tales so this kind of compliment means a lot to me. And especially thank you for recommendations that I will remember for the future games. It was my first time exporting game from RPG maker and I thought that if I chose "autorun on" the setting should be transferred to the exported game :( I hope you got to see the good ending as well! And the baker's family has unfortunately died in war, but I like your dark theory :) The baker moved to this town (was exiled) already alone and built this huge house as part of a "delusion" that their family is still alive.
Have good references of Zelda in head, I like it!
aile
2023-05-04 10:41
I enjoyed this game! You've done such a good job! The art was beautiful, and as mentioned above the music and different themes for different areas were immersive. The story was engaging! Loved that there were two possible endings.
When moving the character around, they very often got stuck, instead of finding the nearest route and heading there. So I spent some time clicking around, trying to find the way. Had Dash enabled, if that makes any difference. (I don't know what would cause this as I haven't used RPGMaker myself)
Really cute art.
kanity
2023-05-04 11:44
@thetatautau thank you, I am glad you liked the art! ^^
kanity
2023-05-04 11:47
@sashalipatov thank you! Zelda is one of my favourite game series :3
kanity
2023-05-04 11:52
@aile thank you so much for your feedback! I will keep in mind the difficulty you mentioned with finding the way, and I added info to the description that the game has three endings (bad, neutral and good)! If I could create a gallery for endings so you can check out your endings and CGs from the main menu, it would be great. Maybe next time ^^
answer21
2023-05-04 20:28
insanely interesting style and nice gameplay!!!1
Very nice entry! It feels crafted with love and attention to detail. The world is interesting to explore, and the various characters feel distinct and engaging to talk to. I liked the art and the mood crated by different music in different places. The only part of the visuals that I didn't like was the movement indicator (the biiiiig flashing white square). Something smaller and slighter would work better, I think. Maybe even a small flashing icon of a shoe or something to that effect.
Very well done overall!
I encountered one bug - I was able to give the potion to the bakery lady without actually having that potion. I was on my first delivery, to the birdhouse, but I decided to go exploring first. I went into the bakery and talked to the lady there. That conversation ended with me giving her a potion. A potion that I didn't have :wink:
gamedocs
2023-05-04 21:04
The art so cute! Great job!
nomersol
2023-05-04 21:54
Pretty art and cute light story, i also had a bug with lady bird, i gave her a potion without being asked for delivery from the witch.
svenerik
2023-05-05 12:56
Very pretty art, has a palette that induces harmonious feelings, really liked it! Lot's of care was taken of the world, though at parts I feel there's a bit too much of walking and empty space, though I guess you had plans for it, but due to the time restrictions couldn't have it full of stuff. Marvelous work on it though, will you be continuing developing it?
Very nice job on the graphics and the story. Musics are also well chosen. Good job :)
Adorable art style! Very reminiscent of the handheld RPG era! Great work, awesome entry!
kanity
2023-05-05 23:50
@answer21 thank you! I am glad you liked the style ^^
@fabula-rasa thank you so much for your feedback, I will note it for future projects! And also thanks for informing me about the bug, I will check it out ^^ Normally you shouldn't be able to even enter the house w/o a potion (I did that due to time constraint) so that def shouldn't have happened! And I am happy my passion for what I created came through :3
@gamedocs thank you! I am so happy that you liked the art!
@nomersol thank you, that's very sweet ^^ I will check all the deliveries for bugs again :)
@svenerik thank you, it's so nice to hear that palette worked well, I took care in choosing it before starting my work on the visuals; and you are completely correct, I planned some side characters, etc, but didn't have enough time. I ended up attached to this world I created so definitely going to develop it further ^^
@kami-amiga thank you, I tried my best ^^
kanity
2023-05-05 23:52
@hyper-ion thanks, I was going for "simple pixel style like in old Zeldas", and I like your comparison too ^^
@kanity You definitely succeeded :) I also loved the different endings, and how the subtle instructions from the Witch helped you get more Seeds of Clarity from all the characters.
kanity
2023-05-06 11:30
@hyper-ion oh I am so glad you went to get different endings, as I understand you got a good one too, that's great ^^ thank you! :3
roitchie
2023-05-06 13:52
Wow this is seriously impressive. Making an RPG in 3 days is no mean feat. As some other people have said the music is really great and I love that every creature has its own song. It has a really magical retro vibe to it with the art style and music combined. Really great entry. Well done!
kanity
2023-05-06 14:12
@roitchie I spent three full days only working on this game, and I am glad you like it and that I managed to convey the atmosphere well, thank you!
really awesome work, i liked all these character animations, really good job ! =D
Nice game! Art was awesome, characters were interesting, and dialogues surprisingly deep (especially in the end). Nice to see another RPG Maker user, good job!
felin
2023-05-06 20:39
I did a first play through of this to rate it, and I might actually go back for more. I liked the mood, the story was simple but had attempts at deeper meaning (for a 3 day project it was good), the outside graphics/music reminded me of the game "cattails" which made me a little nostalgic. I liked how the different houses had different music and I liked how there are different endings (I got the bad one! :(). Super easy to get into the mood of it as well. My only potential criticism is I didn't really like the movement system and would have liked the option to move/interact via keyboard (something like WASD for movement and space/E for interact). If this became a longer game someday I would definitely play it!
kanity
2023-05-07 11:26
@chocoland-tv thank you, I am glad you liked the animations ^^
@darchankaen thanks so much! RPG maker really saves those of us who can't code ^^''
@felin thank you so much for such heartfelt feedback, it makes me happy you enjoyed my game! Bad ending CG is my favourite though :D I was going to make it a more sad and melancholic game but added a good *happy* ending for my mom and sister :) I am not sure if you were playing with mouse (?) but you can move with arrow keys and interact with Enter. Since I am not a programmer I just used what system RPG Maker has. Maybe I can change more things if I read up on javascript or move to unity with c#. Anyway, I am glad to hear such nice words, and I will definitely continue working on this game as well as on my other projects ^^
sodoj
2023-05-07 12:01
Wow, this is a surprisingly meaty and polished jam entry. You managed to create a lovely little world, full of interesting characters and a well done world building. I enjoyed myself with this one, well done!
riley9
2023-05-07 14:30
i love how quickly the mood changed during my playthrough and how different the creatures living in this world perceived this place than i did! i was always waiting to speak to the next character and i always liked what they said. and! the most interesting part for me was how you designed the interior of their houses! i felt like i could see a little bit deeper into their souls next to what they told me :3
xparker
2023-05-07 15:33
The web link at the end seems to be dead - at least I get a 404.
To the game:
+ Very relaxing background music and nice ambience. + good story - Clunky controls - at least changing directions sometimes feels like it.
kanity
2023-05-07 17:53
@sodoj I am so happy you enjoyed the game, thank you!
@riley9 thank you so much for your sweet comment, I did try to tell more about them both with interior and their surroundings so I am glad you appreciated it <3
@xparker thank you for the heads up, it did work for me when I posted it but now also shows 404, I'll see what I can do to fix it; it makes me happy that you liked the story, and thanks for your critique about controls, I'll keep it in mind for my next work if I can adjust them somehow ^^
This game is haunting, but in a good way. I don't have the patience to go through multiple endings for a jam game, but I thouroughly enjoyed my playthrough.
kanity
2023-05-07 18:23
@wrong-timeline thank you! I am glad you enjoyed it ^^ if you are curious, you can just scroll to the end of my video walkthrough to check out other endings without going through the game again :) 32:53 is normal, and 42:03 is good ^^
wuppos
2023-05-07 19:39
Delivering things and exploring the kinds of problems different magical creatures have was a very interesting and cool take on the theme I think. You also managed to sell that personality of each creature and the differences between them really well. With the different dialogue, the special houses and unique music they all felt really different. I was afraid the game would become boring, as the gameplay itself is not very interesting, but it was the complete opppsite. Each time I was really curious about what the next creature would say or do. Really great job!
Having multiple endings is also really impressive for a jam game :O Myself I got the bad ending, but I did not really understand why if I am honet. I guess it was because I drank the dreaminess potion at the end, but surely the things I said to all the creatures also had an influence on this? It was not entirely clear to me which saying certain things was 'correct', whereas other things were not.
That said, I really liked what you did with this game. It felt very cohesive and the story was very interesting. I enjoyed it a lot :D
Great Story and gameplay you have here! I still thinking that how did you made it in 72 hours!!
You have a great creativity mind!! Great game!!
Also play my gane!
I loooooved this game! I loved the color palette and the character design (especially the more 'monstery' ones) and the music choices. The writing too was lovely, sad and whimsical! I wish it was a bit easier to get all the endings-- I got the bad ending, and then the normal one, and I realize that there's probably another ending that can be found by getting all the seeds, but I missed getting one from the fairy, and I don't want to play the whole game again just to get it. I really loved the game overall though. The vibes were so wistful!
kanity
2023-05-11 13:37
@wuppos thank you so much for your feedback, I am happy that you enjoyed the game and didn't find it boring ^^ Most time-consuming part of making different endings was drawing the CGs for them :) And on topic of the endings:
1. Bad ending - you get it if you drink the potion, no matter how many seeds of clarity you collected 2. Normal ending - you don't drink the potion and you collected some or none SoC 3. Good (Best) ending - you don't drink the potion and you collected ALL seeds of clarity
There is a reason for each "correct" answer. It's mostly about challenging their delusions/problems.
Alala doesn't want to admit their feelings, that's why they can't move on. So you have to ask about said feelings instead of just agreeing with them. Then Alala will be one step closer to realizing that they DO have feelings because they feel lonely, and they will try to spend more time with their pet and other villagers instead of sitting at home mulling over their impossible love.
Bolobo doesn't want to believe their family has died in war. They are delusional and built a huge house to pretend they still have a big family. You confront them with the fact their kids are nowhere to be seen. Facing the reality, again, will help Bolobo to move on and make new connections with other villagers.
Swoo misses the city and mopes around in their home, chilling in the baths that remind them of their favourite pool. But you have to encourage them to go outside, so they see all the flowers, butterflies, nature, and find delight in that instead of being cooped in inside.
Marere has PTSD from participating in the war, where they also lost their arm. They have nightmares every night so they take the potion to sleep deeply as much as they can, distancing themselves from reality and just trying to forget. Encourage them by taking interest in their art - encourage them to put their feelings into art, which can be very therapeutic.
Lastly, Sofia is the hardest one. Basically talking about her son just makes her mad. As witch has said, "ask her about humans". If you ask this general question, Sofia will look at you - a human child - and realize that there is no point in detaching herself from humans, because just as this child is not guilty of other humans' actions, Sofia herself is also not at fault for giving birth to a human who waged a war on the magical creatures.
Sorry for the long write-up, but if you read through it, I hope it is clear now why these choices are correct <3
kanity
2023-05-11 13:43
@random-ideation-studios thank you ^^ I have worked whole three days non stop, not doing anything else :D Had to push my actual work project a bit x) And I have played your game now and left a comment :)
@perryseity I am so happy you liked the game, and wistful vibes are definitely what I was going for, thank you! <3 There is a good/best ending also, yes, and unfortunately if you didn't save often you would need to start over :( I thought it would be ok since the game is short, and I myself am used to saving a lot because I am a fan of visual novels ^^ But if you want to check out the good ending, you can just click on the video I uploaded in this post, on YouTube, and go to 42:03 time, unfortunately I didn't record it well so the screen with the game is covered a bit by me, but I read all the dialogue aloud and you can look at the final CG ^^
I beat it! I got the bad ending but then I watched your walkthrough and loved your explanation! Thanks for the great game. Your reading in your walkthrough is really dramatic and great.
i liked the depth of the narration, the little ambiances changing from one location to another (i loved the portal and the faerie island). i was wondering why my seeds didn't do anything, but that's just because i drank the potion haha
Capture d’écran 2023-05-11 à 21.42.59.png
I see that much effort went into the story and this is a strength of this game. I can't say much in terms of humor. It didn't feel like the game is supposed to be funny. If I were to improve one thing - I would look at ways to give the player the feeling of being more in control.
kanity
2023-05-11 21:16
@fabdynamic oh thank you, I am glad that my walkthrough was helpful and that you liked it! ^^ I tried my best to change my voice a little bit for each character, it is only unfortunate I didn't notice that the screen with the game was partly covered. Thank you for playing the game and sharing your thoughts <3
@amarokczukay thank you, I am happy that you liked it! yeah unfortunately seeds don't help if you drink the potion ^^' but this is my favourite CG of all three! :) you can check out other endings in the video if you didn't, I just added time stamps to make it easier ^^
@xsangyhix I think I was so concentrated on the fact I should opt out of audio since it's not mine but stock RPG maker one, I didn't realize there is also another category I should opt out of. Yes, it's not supposed to be very funny, aside from some sarcastic/dark humour, maybe. Thank you for your suggestions, I will think about it!
What a sweet little story. It was very sad at first, delivering potions to help the characters ignore their problems. After getting the normal and bad endings, I initially thought that maybe the way to get the good ending was to try deliver potions to the wrong recipients in some way that helped them, but then I read some of the comments here and realised what seeds of clarity signified. In retrospect I suppose that's quite obvious really and explains the significance of the dialogue options for each character.
Bringing people deliveries that they want but are actually making their lives worse is a great interpretation of the theme. The overall message of the game is very positive, and the good ending is truly heartwarming.
Love the storyline here and the pixel art, super impressive! Can tell you put in a lot of effort into making this. Had fun playing!
garlic
2023-05-12 17:56
I'm not really a fan of RPG Maker games. However I gave yours a try and didn't make it all the way to the end. I looked at the walkthrough to see the ending though. A clever idea to include a video like that with the game! The art is 10/10, and I love the music as well. The game was a bit too slow paced for me, again, RPG maker is not my preferred game style. I'm surprised you managed to make 40 mins (!!!) of story-driven gameplay in just 3 days. Good job!
I think you did a great job creating a magical world with interesting characters and emotion. Very hard to pull off in a jam, nice work.
kanity
2023-05-15 13:51
@david-yates thank you for your touching comment, almost made me tear up :) I am so glad you got both sad vibes and a positive message too!
@janice-lee thank you, I am happy you liked it! I tried my best to use these three days to the fullest ^^ And I loved your game so much as well! :)
@garlic thank you for giving it a try! I know everyone has different preferences in game genres :) And I am super happy the video was useful, I wanted people to be able to see all the endings w/o having to play through multiple times if they don't feel like it ^^ And I am glad you liked the art is well, thank you for your kind words <3
@sleepystudios thank you, I spent a good chunk of time on narrative and character design, I am glad you liked it ^^
The graphics in this game are surprisingly detailed. The intricate textures and well-crafted models make it feel like a labor of love
kanity
2023-05-16 14:22
@stevie257 thank you, I spent a lot of time drawing all the assets, I am glad you liked them!
kiv
2023-05-16 19:02
This is so cozy, kind and sad simultaniusly. The story and characters are wonderful, and the art and the music fits them. For me personally Bolobo story is the most heratbreaking. Thank you for this gem.
kanity
2023-05-18 00:44
@kiv Thank you, it warms my heart to read such a nice review <3 I am glad you liked my game! ^^
Fantastic art style! If you'll continue to work on it, it can be a good big game! Well done!
kanity
2023-05-18 18:13
@gamescodedogs thank you ^^ I am definitely going to polish it and add stuff I didn't have time to add!
A really awesome entry! This was the strongest "mood" game I've played this entire Ludum Dare. The story was really strong in this game; it's rare to see a game jam game tackle human issues such as "coping mechanisms", and I really appreciated how much that made this game stand out. A great job with the artwork and character building. Amazing work, please keep making games!
kanity
2023-05-19 11:13
@steve-sparkes wow, thank you for such high praise on mood, I am glad to hear it and I am happy that you liked the game! I am really interested in human emotions and psychology so it inevitably influences my ideas even without me realizing :) And I am definitely going to make more games, thank you <3